Real Battle, Buildings, Recruitment (RBBR) for BC 2.3

[rusnmat]

I read that spearmen have an edge defending/fighting on walls in BC. That is might be that issue. I am testing and fixing how units behaive in open field, where prior spearmen did defeated swordsmen and axemen units.
From what I read, historically taking a castle or high walled city required at least 3 times the troops of defender ( without cases when gates where opened by spies or walls taking down by trebueshets or other advanced siege equipment).
It didn't guaranteed a victory though, generals prefered to have at least 5 to 1 advantage in order to take a highly fortified castle.
Personally, It alsways bothered me how easy is to take highly fortified settlements in vanilla, in TW or SS.
There is might be some problem with spearmen on walls in BC, I haven't look at that closely yet.
But defending walls units should definately have a huge advantage especially vs coming up the ladders units.
Using commong sence, if a man, who just climbed up to a wall, and what he sees is 5-6 spearpoints atacking him from different directions, that man will be in rough shape. I am not talking about defenders just pusing him off the walls with spears or other such weapons. In my latest Seljuk campaign, I'd always use trebuchets to make gaps in wall, because climbing up the ladders is very costly ( the way it should be in my opinion)

[ninja51]

The attacking arguement makes sense, going up against any number of men while climbing a latter should be tough, let alone 5 or so weapon points. Problem is, spearmen have the advantage regardless. 5 axmen surrounding them didnt kill the first lot, they just got cut down by 4 men, then once the spearmen had taken a portion of the wall, butchering half of my men with very small losses, they just mopped up. Attacking a settlement should be quite the challenge, but spearmen as is ruin it regardless of if your attacking or defending. Anything that is up against a spear unit on a wall will loose, not just realisticly take losses, they dont stand a chance.

The spearmen at least do seem to fight more realisticly on land so your work does seem to be successful on that front. They still do have a tendancy to really tear through attacking units they shoudlnt (My Spultcher Guards against some mid level spearmen saw me loosing a good 30% irregardless of their near complete plate armour and higher skill in everything.)

[rusnmat]

After running some tests today, I will tweak some spearmen units further - reducing their attack vs infantry. There are other factors in play as well. I think that spearmen get advantage in large units due to bigger reach of their weapons. For instance, I usually play & test on large units settings for different reasons. If you play on huge settings spearmen will get some advantage vs large settings. On normal and small settings they will be at some disadvantage.

[Dago Red]

Dago Red, It is good point to change Outremer swordsmen. Since they were raised and trained in Jerusalem area, they'll be getting heat and terrain penalties same as neighboring people, as Armenians for instance ( no bonuses for desert, but no penalites for desert and high heat tollerance).

Oh, that's great! I didn't know how many parameters there were to choose from, glad there is sime middle ground that affords no penalty, but doesn't bonus them either. I thought "bonus" for fighting in desert was a bit much but in thinking about how to rearrange the KoJ roster it seemed fitting to differentiate the Outremer units that way. Your choice is more realistic.

Also I noticed that Otr. swoerdsmen has description of medium level swordsmen but stats of entry level, militia grade unit. I increased their costs and some skills to correctly reflect the description.

Awesome, I agree with this fully, and was saying as much in a thread about the KoJ. I would do this across the board for most of the low/medium KoJ units, but with that also decrease their numbers a bit -- to reflect the their historically low numbers, but superior arms. However, Outremer units should be exempt from the number decrease since they would be the only few units truly drawn from the region.

I assigned AP attribute to Harafishas and lower weapon attack value ( since they use maces) and adjusted weapons speed. With that Outremer swordsmen should win over Harafisahs with 40-50% loses taken.

I worry here though that you've not just fixed the Outremer swords but also given the Harafisha's an advantage that may unbalance things. Against the lightly armored troops they will not perform too well, as you say, but against the very expensive and limited pool of Knightly Orders will they be too effective?

If the Ayyubids suddenly get a dirt cheap, AP fodder unit, it could unbalance the contest with the KoJ's most powerful units. I noticed for example that the BC team greatly decreased the stats of the northern axemen milita AOR troops who had AP axes. They were too cheap and too plentiful and did too much damage to heavily armored men. So, that's something to consider. The KoJ needs it's knights to survive and when it loses them in great numbers it should be against Tawashi or Mamluk level troops.

[rusnmat]

Most of units in my mod that have AP (exept double handed axemen) have low attack value. Units with double handed axes have much larger attack delays. Previously, attack by mace or sword had the same attack delay as large axe. So because of that all AP units vs low armor units will be weaker than sword units and vs heavy armor units will be quiet stronger. All AP attack values been rebalance. There is no grossly overpowered units in the game now..

[rusnmat]

Just finished all GHORID and KYPCHAK units

[Iskender]

Great job rusnmat - it's great to be able to play real combat stats with the beautiful Broken Crescent units. Now if only someone would do real recruitment...

I think that I've noticed something funny with the global combat balancing factors in battle_config.xml. I initially noticed this when it seemed that un-armoured horse archers were extremely arrow-resistant and could outshoot my foot archers. In broken crescent I seem to have these values:

<missile-target-accuracy>
<infantry>0.79</infantry>
<cavalry>0.56</cavalry>
<elephants>0.39</elephants>
</missile-target-accuracy>
<melee-hit-rate>1.75</melee-hit-rate>

Which suggests to me that cavalry are less likely to be hit by arrows than infantry. At the top of his RC 2.0 stats file, point blank has:

<!-- global combat balancing factors -->
<combat-balancing>
<missile-target-accuracy>
<infantry>1.0</infantry>
<cavalry>1.5</cavalry>
<elephants>2.0</elephants>
</missile-target-accuracy>
<melee-hit-rate>1.50</melee-hit-rate>
</combat-balancing>

i.e. cavalry are more likely to be hit by arrows - and in RC for SS/TATW archers cause serious problems for un-armoured horses. The melee hit rate balancing factor is also different.

[Dago Red]

The thing is....

Are those values measures of how often a unit will be hit "all the time" or just while standing still? Because while a horse presents a larger target, a horse archer is never standing still for that long (even if they are standing still in the game, this does not represent reality - the player cannot control all units simultaneously and the AI is stupid).

In other words, mounted archers should be harder to hit, because they are moving targets -- and no the circling feature doesn't cover this reality well enough because that's a special tactic on top of what moving the horse archers would be doing regularly (and most don't even have it). So even an unarmored horse benefits from movement, in fact that's the whole point of horse archers - taking advantage of mobility, which includes not allowing yourself to be an easy target.

However, I wish there were a second value allowing for a much greater hit rate at point blank/short ranges... though I assume it's covered by a factor involved in the attacking unit's stats, they dont' seem to be high enough. That same moving target will be much easier to hit if it's 10 feet away.

[rusnmat]

i.e. cavalry are more likely to be hit by arrows - and in RC for SS/TATW archers cause serious problems for un-armoured horses. The melee hit rate balancing factor is also different.

I might take a look at those files later. I am working to finish EDU file. I want to give ability to hire mersanaries to many factions. Right now every faction has just a few merc. units that they can hire.
I want to make it that majority of units can be hired by anyone, some units only by christians or muslim, and just a few exclusive units as vagardian guards to be hires only by one faction.

In my opinion, mounted archers should be a lit bit harder to kill. The already have much lower accuracies in BC ( and in my projectile file). In SS & TATW accuracies of HA often almost the same as foot archers.. Sizes of many HA units in BC are larger than sizes of HA units in SS as well..
Anyhow, if you 'd look at common sence - yes a horse and a rider are bigger target than just a men so it should be easier to hit. But the big conterargument is that firing an arrow to a horse might not kill it at all. Historically many HA had more than one horse. Mongols would bring 2 extra horses for each horseman.
Even if a horse(s) is killed if a man is not injured - he will become a foot archer Anyway, due to limitation of game mechanics, I think that the most realistic is to say that mounted archer should be harder to kill (not by much though).
With Elephants it should be even harder. Any arrows would do very little damage to an elphat himself, even without any armour/padding on top of elephats, cause their skin is so thick. It might anoey them a bit or so. So only logical aim for archers to aim to would be the riders and archers in a wooden box on top.
Since they will be protected by that box, archers changes to hit them would be smaller not bigger.

As much as I personally like RB/RC with its easy unit classifications and clear structure for stats, there are some areas that it not very realistic, and doesn't applly well. I had some discussions with point blank about it.
As in RB there is division archers on skirmishers and missile unit ( in BC all archers are the second).
I want to impement skirmishers type to for some entry/level archers in BC
Skirmishers type fires more slowly, which is great to represent untrained units.
But in RB they gave skirmishers much higher accuracies, that doesn't makes much sence to me at all..
In RB you have Yeoman Longbowmen and Janissary archers with lower accuracies than some mediocare Baltic archer skirmisher

[Iskender]

I know what you both mean about the difficulty of hitting moving horses, and it is kind of silly if all of your horse archers get killed straight away by foot archers. I think that the cantabrian circle simulates the difficulty of hitting horse archers well though (and other moving horses are also hard to hit). Personally, I'd like a unit of foot archers to be able to defeat a unit of horse archers of similar quality, otherwise horse archers are too hard to counter and there's not much point to foot archers.

The hit probability value also applies to other cavalry, so e.g. medium-armoured lancers (who wouldn't be rushing around all the time) are also very resistant to arrows. If a horse is tough enough to withstand an arrow hit, then maybe an un-armoured horse should add armour (they can also presumably withstand a bit of a stabbing)? The same argument applies to elephants as well.

As in RB there is division archers on skirmishers and missile unit ( in BC all archers are the second).
I want to impement skirmishers type to for some entry/level archers in BC
Skirmishers type fires more slowly, which is great to represent untrained units.
But in RB they gave skirmishers much higher accuracies, that doesn't makes much sence to me at all..
In RB you have Yeoman Longbowmen and Janissary archers with lower accuracies than some mediocare Baltic archer skirmisher

I know this is a somewhat artificial distinction made necessary by the game mechanics, but I quite like it as I think it adds tactical depth and makes more units useful. I imagine my skirmishers out in front of my line, crouching in the bushes and taking their time to line up accurate direct shots, while the more highly-trained archers behind the lines saturate an area with rapid indirect fire.

More mercs would be great.

[rusnmat]

From my tests, FA of the same quality would defeat HA still because of higher acuracies and larger unit size.

With the skirmishers, if longbowmen/janissary archers were in front of troops, they wouldn't be having difficulties hitting the same target, or have lower accuracies than some levies/peasants. In my opinion, they are just better troops that cost more than skirmishers. The same way as elite heavy cavalry will always defeat light cavalry in melee. It's just the way it is, it's just a supperior unit. The heavy cavalry will cost more to rectruit and upkeep than light cavalry does

[raest]

Mongols would bring 2 extra horses for each horseman.

they were required by law to bring at least one extra horse with them. some brought as much as 10 (if not more).

also, regarding monogols, why are so many of them "untrained" or only "trained"? after all, one of the key reasons why they were so successful was their extremely high degree of training and discipline (they're often regarded as the first 20th century army ) from the lowest up to the highest rank.

[Iskender]

With the skirmishers, if longbowmen/janissary archers were in front of troops, they wouldn't be having difficulties hitting the same target, or have lower accuracies than some levies/peasants. In my opinion, they are just better troops that cost more than skirmishers. The same way as elite heavy cavalry will always defeat light cavalry in melee. It's just the way it is, it's just a supperior unit. The heavy cavalry will cost more to rectruit and upkeep than light cavalry does

I can see your point - it's a shame the game mechanics are so limiting.

With the extra horses - would they actually take them into battle though, and swap mid-way through a fight? I can see that most cavalry would probably need to take extra horses on a long campaign in case they go lame, get injured or need a rest or something.

[Dago Red]

On moving targets:
The game doesn't seem to differentiate the difference in targeting between a motionless unit and one that's moving. If it does, it's fooling me about it. In fact, some of the biggest causualties you can get are when a unit is moving -- try firing a flaming ballista at a group of moving horse (of any kind) and see how devastating it can be. You will often end up killing even more than when they are standing still because more move into the line of fire as the bolt moves through the group.

What's more, units will sometimes do this flip move where they show their backs suddenly while moving, it happens often, and exposes the unit's less defended rear/flank for no reason.

So now you have a moving target that's-
1. just as easy to hit as one standing still
2. which gets more casualties from heavy fire do to bunching up and moving into fire they would normally not if standing still
3. Keeps exposing rear and flanks unnecessarily while under fire, causing even more casualties with reduced armor values.

That's the key reasons why I think mounted units should be given "harder to hit" values -to make up for these failings of the engine. Add to it all the things you're saying about extra mounts, etc.

[rusnmat]

Finished all mercenaries units except elephants. Each faction can hire much more different mercenaries now. You can see available merc. for each faction at custom battle screen. After I finish with EDU file, I will check and rebalance mercenaries pool for each area.
Starting with auxilia units, should finish all EDU pretty soon

[raest]

With the extra horses - would they actually take them into battle though, and swap mid-way through a fight?

indeed they did. at relatively regular intervals, iirc

[rusnmat]

Just finished all units except elephants. Should be done with elephants within 2 days.

[ninja51]

Just finished all units except elephants. Should be done with elephants within 2 days.

Awesome! Really excited to start playing with this as soon as I can

[Rex Inanimatus]

Just finished all units except elephants. Should be done with elephants within 2 days.

Wondering what you will do to Dumbo, enjoying the minimod

[rusnmat]

Thanks, Today I decided to completely finish with mercenaries. I redone all availabilites, costs and mercenaries hiring pools. Now every faction can hire bigger variaty of mercs and costs are in line with other stats..The file is available for download on the first page.